Four Methods:

• Landmarks and Drive Times,

• Maps

• Right Route

• Effectiveness

When you give directions to hotels guests how to get to a local museum, or nearest ATM, you should be prepared to give good and correct directions, mainly because this could be a simple experience they will have which will turn in to a bad reviews and loosing couple of stars in your rating. You should keep in mind that giving directions, is more complicated than you think, its not just telling your guest how to get to from point A to point B. Giving direction to your guest is an art, you need to present the that in manner that your guest understands best you have to under stand that each possesses information in different way. For an example, some guests could understand directions with specific mileages, while others do by the time. Most-importantly you have to present it in a manner that he/she could remember well because they will have to comeback to the hotel again, so that effective and best suited route has to be picked in order to help the person to find their way to and back.

1

Visualize you going to that destination and taking that route

its always easy to follow directions best when they’re described in a manner, that focuses on what you see on the way and the distance/time between landmarks you mention. Put you self in their shoes think of how you’d point out the direction if you are there (eg “Turn right at after the railway road next to three story building, then continue on that road for a mile which take about 5 minutes.”). You can see that even if the right turn is not visible at once that, they know that it is next to the 3 story building, which they will not miss.

2

hard-to-miss landmarks. Like in the previous example it is necessary to give him/her a sense of progress and confirm on their route time to time like for an example after turning you can mention that you will see a temple on your right on half way through, but you will have keep in mind that that should be the only temple they will see on that part segment of the route. Landmarks will give the person an idea of the progress they’re making. So it is important to find uniqueness In the land marks you are selecting because big white house will not be a proper land mark because you will see big white houses more frequently than you expect.

3

Specify whether something is on the left or right of the road. Always specify which side of the road you are talking about. Do not expect guest to get their and look for both sides.

4

Provide travel distance / time estimates : Time component is a really important for traveler because they will need to start their journey with ample time to spare and also while traveling they will have sense of how much of the journey they have completed importantly they will have a sense when they should start their journey back. Remember to provide time/distance between each turning point.

5

Create a street map of the route, and share it. Some travelers are born with (“survey perspective”) reading maps than others. So they tend to better with map directions than verbal equivalent. So keep a copy of VottsUp directions booklet at your desk always, so that a street map is there for each and every destination in the booklet. Most-importantly, the guest may be asking for a location that you are not aware of. We have found that people who are born and bought-up in the area of the hotel does not know of some historical tourist attraction within 2 km distance

6

Explain the route based on where the person is coming from.  This is another important factor, importance of proper directions plays a major role in whether the customer is going to stay at your hotel or not. When a guest, asks for directions from the airport of train station you have to choose the best route that they could take to get to your hotel. But some times it is not easy as you think. Some times its very handy to keep a point identification link like VottsUp directions booklet provides handy at your phone to text them so that they could find their way. Or if your hotel web site is hosted with ClickNSource, directions to the hotel link is always there on pages. So it as easy as directing them to your domain via a text.

7

Give the simplest route. Assuming that you do not have a your web site hosted with ClickNSource or user does not have the VottsUp App downloaded, your will have to provide directions verbaly and discretely. However it may seem tempting to give him/her directions to your favorite shortcut, but unfortunately this could wind up loosing the customer. Hence, give the simplest route possible that is least likely to confuse the guest. Routes consist of

with less turns, some times its better late than never;

Routes via highways;

with less confusion at turns and on the straight roads

8

Safest route. Provide the safest route possible as if you are giving direction to your own kid. Because guest’s safety is always of the highest priority. Specially if they are walking routes via the city is better than inner routes with less people hanging out. If your guest faces something bad while taking a route you have suggested you are partly liable for what has happened to them because you suggested the route. Where as you could avoid this problem all together by directing to the page on a VottsUp directions booklet of your hotel as it lets guest choose the route they are comfortable.

9

Don’t suggest routes you haven’t taken.  Focus routes which you are familiar with, or else you might end providing wrong directions. This is where VottsUp direction booklet tailer made to your hotel plays a major role where you always give them the GPS point and they could simply pull up Google maps and choose the best suited direction them.

10

Warn the person about confusing parts of the route. This is the part your have to be very clear of; as you may know some times you find roads where main road bears to right/left and but there is side road goes straight ahead, so people tend to take the straight road or some times turn appears suddenly after bend where they have to be ready to take the turn. Make sure you mentioned these points very clearly to the guest.

11

Speak slowly and clearly. Its important to speak clearly and slowly because some times your guest may not speak English or the language you speak and it may be difficult for them to understand what you say. This is where having a web site provided by ClickNSource gives you a advantage over others where you could simply provide them the link or use VottsUp directions booklet of your hotel and point the to the page in question, where they could scan the code and go the exact point link and get directions in the language they prefer.

12

Never Assume that guest knows any thing about the location in question: They may be little familiar with the are but you have to provide information as if the person has never been to this area and does not know about any landmark. Therefore avoid things like turn at the 7^th mile post junction, which may be a familiar and well known place for locals but it is not for the guest.

13

Ask and you shall be given. Be direct and ask whether they have any question about what you mentioned, it could be related to the route or may it could be related to a point you mentioned with the route. Hence it will allow the guest to clarify any unclear areas, and furthermore it will allow them to get information about other places they be planing to visit.

14

Making sure that they memorized/recorded . You can ask them repeat the direction or else since most of them are millennial travelers, they always carry smart phones and you can make sure that they have saved the link on their phone to pick it up when they needs it.